Deception
by ealganora
Summary: AU pre-mini.  Kara Thrace is an undercover operative for the Colonial Fleet Investigative Service who works as a flight instructor to crack a drug ring.
1. A good day to die

Chapter One - A good day to die.

To say that she was surprised to be called to her flight instructor's office three weeks before graduation was an understatement. What had she done wrong? For the past three years and seven months, she had been nothing but the model cadet. Her flying was textbook, she never contradicted an order, never questioned the seemingly endless string of pointless exercises. The Academy was her ticket to leaving her former life behind, to getting off world and out amongst the stars. Gods what more did these people want from her? Her knock echoed throughout the empty corridor.

"Enter." The Colonel's harsh tone caused her shoulders to sink even further before she pulled herself together. Opening the door she snapped to attention, arm raised in salute, booted heels snapping together, eyes straight ahead.

"Cadet Madera, please have a seat." Turning to do as requested she noticed that two other men were already occupying chairs across from the large wooden desk. One was Admiral Michael Oliver the head of the Colonial Fleet Investigative Service. The other was her fellow cadet, Karl Agathon. Clarice didn't know if it was possible for her face to fall much further as she took her seat. CFIS must have found out that she had forged her enlistment papers. Oh Gods had Karl somehow found out about her secret?

"Cadet, it would appear you have been withholding some key information about your past." The Admiral's voice was deep and harsh, the kind of voice that demanded attention without even trying. "Do you have anything to say for yourself?"

"No, sir." It was a struggle to keep her voice even and she was only moderately successful. She couldn't handle this, couldn't deal with having all her pre-Academy indiscretions thrown back in her face. Her future may be over, but there was no way that she was going to cry in front of these men. "Sir, I'll just go pack my things, and be out of your hair in an hour." Snapping off another salute, slightly shocked as she disobeyed an order for the first time even if it was just something as simple as 'sit down.' She was halfway to the door before Phillips called her back.

"Sit down Cadet! Your career here at the Academy may be over but the Admiral has an interesting proposition I think you should hear."

"The Colonel is correct and I would appreciate if you would hear me out." The Admiral was speaking before she had even set her feet in motion and continued to speak without acknowledging her murmured "Yes, sir."

"Clarice Madera may have been credited by a priestess of Artemis who had more computer knowledge then she should, but that doesn't change the fact that you are among the top pilots in your class. Yes you lied. Should you be punished? Most definitely. However, CFIS just happens to be in the market for superb pilots who can assume another's identity. Are you following me Cadet?"

"Yes, sir." So CFIS wanted to recruit her? She worked hard to stomp out the hope that was blossoming in her chest. It wouldn't do to get excited over nothing, not until she knew what was really going on here.

"CFIS fears that a dangerous situation has been developing, but our current intelligence has been coming up with nothing but speculation and dead ends. What we need is a deep cover agent who would be able to move freely and not have any previous ties to the Service. I'm not going to sugar coat the situation Cadet, this is a high risk and a high stakes game. You could be under for years. I can't even read you into the details until after you've agreed to the mission."

Deep cover? She almost couldn't keep the smirk off her lips. The Admiral was right she did have experience, after all what had she been living for the past six and a half years. Only problem was that she clearly wasn't all that good at it if three weeks shy of her goal her deception had been discovered. But who was she to turn away this gift, what some might even call a miracle, a second chance. The Fleet still wanted her, still needed her. Apparently they needed pilots, and flying was all she ever truly wanted to do.

The Colonel was looking at her expectantly, awaiting an answer, an answer that would seal the fate of her future. The Admiral seemed content to wait it out, to allow her the luxury putting her thoughts in order.

"I'll do it. Whatever you need me to do, I'll do it." The breath she hadn't realized she had been holding left her lungs in a slow hiss.

The Colonel let out a half-hearted chuckle. "See Mike, I told you she was your girl."

"Yes you did. Well first things first Cadet Madera, you're going to have to die."

She should have seen this coming.

The day of her of her final practical flight test dawned bright and sunny. Almost as if Apollo himself had blessed the crazy-assed plan cooked up by the CFIS. If she had never met Admiral Oliver, never agreed to put her life into his hands, then today would have been the day that she earned her wings. Instead it was the day of her death. At least it was a good day to die.

The ground hanger was crowded with cadets, instructors, and ground crew. The people who she had brought into her life over the past three and a half years, the people who thought that they knew her, the people who would grieve for her if things went to plan today.

The plan itself was deceptively simple, one well placed charge behind her ejection seat timed to blow five seconds after she pulled the chair release. Pray the squibs inside her helmet worked the way they were supposed to and volia one dead cadet.

She was silent through out the pre-flight checks. But nothing abnormal there, Clarice Madera was always by the book. Always serious and professional. Why should today be any different?

Pre-flight complete, she settled into wait. Even going so far to allow her eyes to close briefly, today was going to be a really long day.

Her squadron was one of the last to break atmo over Picon, flying almost perfect formation. "Tighten it up Phillips," she barked into the comm. She couldn't help the sigh that escaped her lips after pulling the first set of manoeuvres successfully. Nothing could beat the feeling of moving through space and feeling the push of g's from her head to her toes pushing the thruster pedals.

"Blue flight you're cleared for combat landings. Call the ball."

"_Triton,_ Madera, roger that. Combat landings. I have the ball." She had never done a combat landing outside of a sim; didn't her instructors know that she had other things to worry about today? But of course, they didn't. She grit her teeth and checked to make sure that Cameron was still flying her wing tight. The port hanger deck of the _Triton _seemed to be coming up way too fast.

Her skids touched down with a little more force then necessary, but not enough to dock her. Cameron wasn't so lucky hitting hard enough to bounce a good foot before reversing thrust and settling to the deck.

"Welcome to the _Triton_ boys and girls. Stay in your birds as your moved to the launch tubes for the next part of the exercise."

It took the knuckle draggers forever and yet no time at all before she was inside a launch tube. Watching as steel gray walls were rushing past and she was slinging out the other side, back into the freedom of space.

More formations, dizzying speed, minutes ticking by. Then it was it, the moment of truth.

Atmo was rushing up at her bird. "Keep it tight and textbook people." _But not so tight that I take one of you with me_. She overcompensated and her nose touched the border between space and planet at the wrong angle. The bounce shuddered through the stick that she struggled to pull back enough to push her ship into a vertical spin. She allowed herself the luxury of seeing that her squad was safe before wrenching the stick sideways and letting go.

She was thrust back into her seat with enough force that reaching for her ejection lever was more than an effort. She could hear her fellow Cadets chattering through the comm., calling her name, calling for help. They weren't a particularly close group not like some of the other squadrons, and she hoped that this incident didn't mess any of them up too badly.

Her squibs burst coating the inside of her helmet and raven black hair in rich red arterial blood, as she finally grasped the yellow and black handle, felt the jar of ejection, the pain from her restraints digging into her suit, bruising her chest, her shoulders. She felt the heat of her viper exploding into a thousand pieces. The bright light obscured by the blood coating her visor, the sound absorbed but not transmitted through the space that now engulfed her.

"Madera, Raptor 423 do you read? Repeat. Madera, Raptor 423 do you read?" Agathon's voice echoed wrongly through the damaged comm. It was hard not to acknowledge, to go against all the procedures that had been drilled into her. She counted the seconds instead. One hundred, two hundred. She had reached 456 before she felt strong arms wrap around her.

Had reached eight minutes when she forced herself to hang limply in her contact's hold as the artificial gravity of the ship took hold. She showed no reaction as he pulled her soiled helmet from her head. Allowed him to check her airway, slipping a pill between her back teeth as he did, his body blocking her from prying eyes as she bit down.

"No response. She's not breathing." He relayed the information to his pilot with just the right note of panic slipping out.

She felt her breath slow even as he faked rescue breathing. Her eyelids were getting heavy as she struggled to keep them open in the mask of death. The pounding of her heart lessoning so much that she no longer worried that the beats would betray her. Rapid re-entry rocked the raptor, as Agathon felt for her now shallow pulse.

"I've got no pulse. She's still not breathing!" The panic in his voice was barely being kept at bay now.

The landing was hard, flinging her body up just as he cradled her for impact. She saw the edge of a white coat rushing into view, as a hand still encased in flight gloves reached up to gently shut her still wide eyes.

"She's dead isn't she?" His voice cracked, filled with equal parts shock, pain and failure. Agathon deserved a frakking Muse award for his performance. She held back a shiver at the cold press of a stethoscope to the chest.

"I'm afraid so son." The gruff voice of the doctor barely penetrated her rapidly closing consciousness.

It was done. Clarice Madera was dead and Kara Thrace would be reborn.


	2. A new old life

Chapter Two - A New Old Life

Something was scratching at her face. She reached up a hand to bat the irritant away, to go back to her peaceful sleep, but her arms didn't want to cooperate. Rolling over didn't seem to work either, but at least the scratching had stopped. She sighed and tried to sink down farther into the unforgiving mattress.

"It's about time you were awake, Thrace." A startling voice barked. _Thrace_? Her eyes popped open violently. Shock clouding her features until she saw the sterile environment around her, the somewhat cloudy form of a white-coated doctor glaring down at her. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she matched his gruff tone to a half remembered memory. Three breaths had passed before she placed him, the man who had pronounced her dead. Right, the mission, _her_ mission, the one she decided to take in order to keep flying, to keep the one part of her frakked up life that made sense.

She moved to try to sit up once more her arms feeling like they were once again attached to her mind, only to be pushed not too gently back down.

"Not so fast. Let the drugs work out of your system first before you dump yourself on the floor." The penlight stung in her eyes. "Follow the light." She did as asked the disciplined nature of Clarice Madera was still ingrained. She would have to work on that.

"Do you know where you are?"

"Sickbay?" Her voice was rough and an octave too deep, but it worked. That was something.

"Close enough." He turned away dropping a rag in a silver bowl as he went. A rag tinged an ugly brown red, the colour of dried blood. The scratching must have been him trying to clean the mess from the squibs off her.

"Your in a CFIS holding facility outside of Thebes." His words were distorted by the cigarette that now dangled from his lips; smoke curling up around his face slowly. "You've been out for almost fourteen hours, though only been here for three." The smell of the smoke reminded her of her mother and dirty base housing, a past better left unspoken.

"And who are you?" It was unnerving not knowing what had happened in the time she had lost, and even more unnerving not knowing whom she was with at this very moment. There were too many details of this new life that she didn't know, wouldn't know until some almighty power decided to fill her in.

"You don't need to know, Thrace. It's bad enough I know what _I_ know. No need to burden us both with more."

She wanted to protest. Knew that Kara Thrace would protest, but talking made her chest hurt, the bruising must have been bad and talking just took up more effort than it was worth.

She let her eyes slip closed as water ran faintly in the background. Only to flash them open quickly at the clang of metal against metal.

"You'll sleep better once you're clean." Steam rose pleasantly from the basin mingling with the blue tinted smoke.

Only now did she look down to notice the filthy state of her tattered tanks, and feel the painful mask of the dried blood that pulled against the hairs on her arm. Part of her wished that this mess had already been taken care of, but a stronger part welcomed the ability to do it on her own.

She reached out for the towel and the soap he provided. Happy that her limbs responded to her commands without too much complaint. "Thanks doc."

He huffed wordlessly, while bending over to retrieve a clean set of tanks, undergarments and sweats from a near by drawer. "Don't thank me yet. I want you to stay in that bed for at least the next twenty-four hours. Tempazendrine messes with the body more then I'd like and you are going to need to be at peak readiness sooner rather then later. You need the head, you yell for me, but other than that, you stay put. Now get some rest, your contact should be here when you wake up."

He stubbed the cigarette out aggressively before leaving her alone. Moving carefully she pulled herself into a sitting position and pealed off the blood caked layers. Oh Gods, 'bruised' didn't do her marred skin justice. No wonder she hurt so much, it was a small miracle that nothing was broken. But the warm water soothed the ache, the water slowly turning colour as she washed away her deceit, her sins swirling and merging with the clear water.

The nameless doctor was right; she would sleep better now that she was clean. Her eyes were heavy once more and she slipped into a mercifully dreamless sleep.

* * *

><p>Voices echoed softly in the recesses of her mind.<p>

"She's still asleep, but it won't hurt to wake her now. The drugs should be out of her system, but I still want her to stay in bed."

"Sure doc. I just need to talk to her, there's more than enough to hash out while we're here." Agathon's deep voice brought her back to consciousness quickly. Maybe she was finally going to get all the details that had been hidden from her.

The blue curtain was pulled back just as she moved to sit up, pushing her pillow behind her back as she went.

"Hey sleepyhead, how are you feeling?" His tone was easy, matching the grin on his face.

She took an inventory of her pains before replying. "Better."

"Good we've got a lot to do today." She looked towards the impressive stack of folders he was carrying, and couldn't help but roll her eyes. Just what she needed, paperwork.

"Is that all for me?" She asked, partially dreading his response.

"Nope, this is all _about_ you." The stack landed in her lap with a thud. "Welcome to your new old life, Thrace." The grin was a full-blown smirk now, and his blue eyes danced. Damn, how had this man been caught up in working for CFIS?

"These are just the hard facts, your service records, a paper trail, utility bills, last place of residence that kind of thing. You can fill in the personal emotional bullshit yourself as you go along." That would be no problem, Kara Thrace had a frakking shipload full of personal emotional bullshit that was strictly need to know, and as far as she was concerned CFIS didn't really need to know. At least not anymore than they already did.

She opened the yellow folder on top eager to see what he had cooked up for a service record. "Let's see what I've been up to." The first thing she noticed was that her birth date was changed. She was now two years older, not much of a surprise. The Fleet didn't let rooks fresh out of the Academy be flight instructors. The rest of the record was far more interesting. Thrace had an impressive list of demerits from her Academy days, drunk and disorderlies, and not the best of grades, but these facts were made insignificant by her natural ability in a viper. Words leapt off the page, 'non-textbook,' 'impressive,' 'completely out of the box.' Yeah Thrace was a hotshot all right. No, not _Thrace_; _I _am a hotshot pilot.

Her initial excitement was fading, only to be replaced with doubt. Could she actually pull this off? Go back into the world, the lifestyle that she had worked so hard to leave behind. And not only that but immerse herself so completely as to be utterly convincing. When had Clarice Madera become more of who she was then the girl she had been born to be?

"Something wrong Kara?" Kara. When was the last time that name had been uttered with concern?

"I'm fine it's just a lot to take in I guess. I mean I knew that this was going to be difficult, but the details just make everything so real." Oh Gods, she was rambling. Kara Thrace did not, under any circumstances, ramble. She had to pull herself together and fast.

"I can leave you alone if you want." He was halfway out of the chair he had sunk into before she had the chance to respond.

"No. You're right there is a lot to do, and I need to know what I'm getting into. I don't want to waste your time. Why don't you tell me what I can't read in these files?"

"For the past fourteen months the Service has been tracking what appears to be an extremely wide spread drug ring. Drugs turning up on one base only to be gone before we even knew they were there. Then the same thing popping up on another base two worlds over. We know bits and pieces. Enough for the big brass to be scared shitless."

"What's so scary about drugs? I mean the Fleet even condones the use of stims and Temp in combat situations. You slipped me Temp to help fake my death."

"Even Temp pales in comparison to what these guys are peddling. Something they're calling crystelene. A Captain turned up dead in a bar on Alerion with an overdose of the stuff. A mix of stims, muscle enhancers and mind sharpeners. The people on this shit must feel invincible. But the drug itself is not so much the issue as who we suspect may be involved in the ring."

"Who do you suspect?"

The folder he added to the pile was the pitch black of advanced top secret. She never really believed that such folders existed. The contents of which were certainly enough to strike fear. Top brass spread throughout the Fleet, at least sixteen and no one below the rank of Major; whatever this was, it was big. "Those are just the parents."

"The parents?" She didn't understand, was this like the _oikia_ on Sagittarion?

"Yeah here's the kicker, these are lifers in the Fleet and we think that they are moving the whole thing through their kids who have followed in their footsteps."

In a way, it was the perfect setup. No one wanted to intrude on the private correspondence of Fleet members. Nor would anyone question meetings between a parent and their child. But how was being an Academy flight instructor supposed to counter any of this?

"So I'm supposed to do what exactly? Keep an eye on Cadets and make sure that they don't get involved in this mess?'

Another file joined the pile. "This is Zachary Adama, second son of Commander William Adama of the _Galactica _and one of our potential suspects. He's entering the Academy on Caprica in two months and we have arranged for him to be one of your students. He's your target, get close to him, as close as possible if you catch my drift and then find out what he knows."

She couldn't keep the shocked expression from her face. "So my mission is to try and get into the pants of the son of a hero of the Cylon War, who you think is pushing drugs?"

"Yeah Thrace, that's the plan." That damn grin was back.

"Well your plan sucks, Agathon." His laughter contrasted starkly with the glare on her face.

"Adama really isn't my type, and you agreed to this, even if you didn't know that going in. Do you job fast and right and you can take your pick of postings as a viper jock in the Fleet." His voice turned hard, the transformation so swift it was frightening. "Don't take this job and you can go live out your brig term until this whole mess is over. You seem to forget Kara that you were headed for dishonourable discharge and the right never to fly again. Is that what you want?"

It was a threat, a threat that she had coming and deserved.

"I'll do it. Do what I have to." Her voice was soft, and his look of caring was back.

"Good, and you Starbuck, can call me Helo." Call signs, the mark of a pilot; it seemed that she had forgotten more than just her deal with CFIS. She was a pilot now, a true pilot. Her smile lit up the room.

* * *

><p>The next two months passed in a whirlwind. There were things they didn't talk about, wouldn't talk about. What the fallout from her death had been at the Academy, how her former friends were handling the situation, the perfunctory investigation into her demise, all carefully executed by CFIS. Instead, her days were spent pouring over viper tech manuals. Ploughing though the outdated sim provided to build on her skills. Or working her body into a state of heightened readiness against the bag hanging in the corner of the warehouse with Helo and the doc as her only companions.<p>

She cried the day the doc chopped off her hair, the symbol of her devotion to Artemis, watching as the black locks fell to the floor all around her. She knew the reasons, short hair fit her profile and was easier to dye, but that didn't make the process any easier. Luckily, the dye that he used worked far better than the cheap box job the priestess had used all those years ago. Little pieces of technology merged with her hair follicles matching the exact shade of her natural colour. How far technology could go was just alarming sometimes.

She didn't want to admit that she was sad to see the gruff older man go, eight days into her warehouse life. It was the same day that Helo kissed her, his lips hot and slick over hers, testing, teasing, as his fingers ghosted up her neck to slide through her short hair. He needed to see if she could go through the motions, if she was prepared to do what it took for her mission. So, she clamped down her surprise and let a breathy moan escape as she slipped her tongue into his mouth and pulled his hips closer. She passed the test.

Things got harder after that. Not just, because there were days when she wanted to press him up against the wall and use her tongue to wipe the ever-present smirk off his face. No, it was the stress of cramming a six month Service course into a month and a half. Being someone else, she could handle, but spy craft was a new and difficult thing to learn. Helo was set to be posted at the Fleet base outside Delphi, but their contact would be limited. "I'm close if you need me, but I'd rather we keep direct contact to a minimum." Dead drops, contingency plans, signals, everyday a new skill.

Three weeks into her stay she was allowed out of the warehouse for the first time. They worked the streets of Thebes, practicing, training, preparing. When they went to a bar at the end of the day she felt more and more like she was sinking into her life as Starbuck. Only Starbuck could not afford to be the lightweight that she was now. They brought five bottles of ambrosia back to the warehouse, and every night she drank to build up her tolerance. Just enough to get by, she refused to become her mother.

Two weeks after that Helo deemed her ready. She headed to the Ourea base in deep space past Geminon. Here she was the conquering test pilot returning home from a long but successful mission. She drank, played and won at triad like nobody's business, until a Major got a little too friendly with his hands under her tanks and she showed him her right hook. The incident may have been staged but she still broke his nose.

A quick trial, a good defence, and a demotion later and she was packing her bags for Caprica. Her talents would be useful in filling the vacant flight instructor position at the Academy there, and her superiors could keep a close eye on her activities during her probationary period. Plus with any luck, the added responsibility should calm her down a bit.

Which is how she ended up in her dress greys two months as four days after her death, standing before a class eager young Cadets. They were all listening with rapt attention to her poetic waxing on the virtues of a viper, their eyes following her every gesture. It was too bad that she couldn't enjoy the moment more, all she could focus on were the piercing hazel eyes of Zak Adama as he sat in the third row. She prayed to the Gods that she wasn't in over her head.


	3. Missions and memories

Chapter Three - Missions and memories.

She sat alone eating her evening meal, incorrectly filling out the crossword of the Caprican Gazette, three days after she had started teaching in a place she didn't belong. Sure she had the chops to fly, and was enjoying teaching much to her surprise, but she was very much an outsider. The too hot coffee burned her throat, much like the looks of barely contained destain from her fellow instructors would have burned her soul, if she let them. Instead, she just rolled her eyes, and took another sip. It made the job easier. The more they hated her, the hotshot pilot who couldn't control her temper, the less likely anyone would interfere with what she had planned.

Her chair protested loudly as she stood, the sound echoing loudly through the instructor's mess. She made no attempt to push it in. Simply walked out, leaving her tray for the cooks, and tucking her paper under her arm. She didn't look back. Starbuck had work to do.

The sun was just setting as she walked down the quiet streets that surrounded the Academy. It was too early for the students to be out for their first weekend of drinking which meant that she had time to stake out the area a little. Her lack of a relationship with the faculty at the Academy would make finding the right bar for her purposes more of a challenge.

Outside Veterans' Park, she dropped her paper on a bench not stopping her stroll missing the bin on purpose. She had just turned onto Fleet St. when her peripheral vision saw a broad shouldered man pick up what she had discarded. She didn't want to think about whether or not it was Helo who picked it up, didn't want to think about what would happen if someone other than him picked up her first attempt at a dead drop. Probably nothing, they would just think that she was the stupidest person alive, for how else was it possible for someone to not know one across?

It was nice to be able to walk the streets freely. To not feel like eyes were constantly upon her. No curious students, instructors or CFIS agents, though if they were lurking in the bushes or hiding out behind apartment windows she probably wouldn't know.

Three blocks further from the Academy in a more seedy area of the city, she found a plausible destination. S_tarlights_ had a poorly painted sign adorned with a small viper and a raptor. She could hear the drone of music from the street and drink specials were advertised in the windows. If Zak Adama fit the profile that CFIS had created this was just the place he would frequent.

She pushed the door open without hesitation, taking in the cloud of smoke that went against more than a dozen regulations from the Delphi Health Office, while the bartender raked his eyes appraisingly up and down her form. She sauntered forward, making sure her hips swayed as she moved and let a grin stretch widely. She had chosen her clothes well. Black tank cut low, her dog tags fully visible, faded jeans that hugged her legs and knee high black boots with a slight heel, enough to add some height but not enough to hamper any running she might need to do. Starbuck didn't bother with makeup she was anything but a girly girl.

"You like what you see?" She asked, laying her palms on the worn wood of the bar.

The bartender was smart enough not to acknowledge the question as she sat down on the high stool. "What can I get you?"

"Three fingers of the good stuff." He nodded once before pulling and filling a glass, setting it before her. "I'll let you know if it's good enough for you to hand over the bottle."

She didn't miss how one eyebrow rose in surprise at her comment, though her eyes quickly moved to survey the rest of the bar. Her field of vision was mostly obscured by her choice of seats, directly in front of the door, but she made out two older men in military garb finishing off a picture of beer in a window booth. A low-key game of triad was going on over by the head, and there were enough murmurings, and clouds of smoke, for her to guess that at least a third of the rest of the booths were occupied.

She tipped back some more ambrosia enjoying the slickness of the burn that coated her throat. This was the good stuff. Signalling the bartender for the bottle, she fished fifty cubits out of her pocket, pulling out a lighter and a cigar as she went.

Pouring another three fingers she blew smoke rings lazily and set back to wait. If Adama was going to show then let him come to her, he had surely been shooting her enough glances in class to make her think that he was at least moderately interested in his young flight instructor.

Time seemed to slow with nothing but the dull thud of glass against wood and the slow drag of her inhale and smooth push of her exhale to mark its passing. She felt her mind drift, and there was no way to bring it back, no way to stop the flood of memories that were better left buried.

_The crush of smoke was almost overpowering as she entered the dive. Ten times worse then the stench that always had seemed to linger in her mother's kitchen. The urge to cough didn't want to go away no matter how much she tried to push it down. _Focus Thrace_. One cough and she was made and that couldn't happen. So she focused on her breathing, slow inhale, even slower exhale, and put a saunter in her hips and a smile on her face as she watched appreciative eyes follow her movements. _

_The short denim skirt that she had pulled from the donation box at a near by temple was too tight but it made her narrow still developing hips look wider and her legs longer. The rough girl picture helped by the low cut blouse that she had stolen from her mother's closet on her way out the door, and the heeled boots and makeup she had purchased with her meagre savings. _

_She may have been two weeks shy of her sixteenth birthday but tonight she could at least pass for nineteen, and no one asked for ID, not that this place really would. Instead, she slid into a booth and ordered a glass of cheap ambrosia. The familiar liquor eased the sting of the smoke on her throat. _

_There was a rambunctious triad going on at a table near the bar. Three men in their twenties battling it out in a haze of cigar smoke. She let her eyes wander, a slow circuit, eventually coming back to the triad table in time to catch the leer one of the men was sending her. Winking, she downed the last of her ambrosia and headed over to the table leaning provocatively over the one empty chair. She smirked as his eyes widened approvingly at the view. _

_"You boys want to deal me in?" Leerer, and his buddy chuckles, seemed game but the third put up a fuss._

_"What you think you got the chops to play with us little girl?" All attitude she moved around to the chair leaning in close to tattoo. Her fingers moving out with hidden grace to pluck the cigar from his month. _

_"I don't think, I _know._" Her smirk never wavered and she exhaled smoke back into his face while she sat down, turning her cough at the foul taste into a bawling laugh. _

_It seemed to satisfy him and he pulled and lit another cigar as he dealt her in. She knew that walking away from that table with more cubits than she sat down with was a combination of luck and being at one too many base party. Nevertheless, it was enough to keep her in her run down apartment, and buy a couple of cheap meals. She was a fast learner. _

_Three weeks later she owned the table and Jim the bartender let her hustle the newcomers who came to the bar, most of them Fleet personnel on leave. It wasn't a great life, but after a good night she had enough winnings to set some aside, to dream on those rare days when she didn't feel like the thought of something better was completely frakked. Sometimes she lost big to someone who managed to hustle her, but the good outweighed the bad enough that it didn't matter. Her frak up of a life was finally her own. _

A bottle shattered somewhere to her left, pulling her back into the present. She blinked and reached to refill her glass, which had emptied. Hopefully it was just her mind that had been vacant.

She returned to scanning the bar, an expression of disinterest on her face. The bar had filled up steadily, and if the military tanks and low slung fatigues coupled with cocky grins were any indication, she had chosen the right bar. All she had to do now was wait.

It was hard to maintain her unconcerned with the world attitude, when she could no longer ignore the feeling of eyes focused on her. But she couldn't turn around, not yet. So she raised her glass to her lips once more and listened to the footfalls as they made their way to her, somehow distinct from all the other sounds in the bar. She knew before she turned sideways, and she sent a quick prayer to the gods before opening her mouth.

"Something I can do for you Adama?" She couldn't keep back the grin that emerged when she took in his expression of surprise. But the surprise was quickly masked by his matching grin, his eyes flashing with a mix of laughter and desire.

"Care to join me and my friends for a game of triad?" His tone was playful, and he only added the respectful 'sir' after she raised an eyebrow in question.

She turned away and reached for a second cigar lighting it before she bothered to reply. "Don't you know that socialising between cadets and instructors is against regs?" She punctuated the word 'socialising' with a puff of smoke and a small smile, leaving not doubt that she had no intention at keeping things social.

"Yeah, well so is smoking in bars, but you don't seem to have any problems with that." She had to give it to him; he sure was quick on his feet. She downed the remains of her glass, the buzz of the liquid gold reaching all the way to her toes.

"Lead on Adama." She gestured smoothly as she slid off the bar stool and reached behind to grasp the bottle on the counter giving him a more than a glimpse of her cleavage.

"You can call me Zak." She laughed as he guided her over to the table that had been previously occupied by the subdued men.

"We'll see. You can still refer to me as God."

He laughed back, the heat of his hand barely skimming her lower back. "Yes sir, God sir."

Four winning hands later, she knew that she was in trouble. Zak was easy to be with, too easy. He laughed easily, lost hand after hand easily, and drank without a care. But the worst was how he played effortlessly off her Kara, and she off him. It was too easy to see him as a guy with a crush who made her laugh like she hadn't laughed in years, and too hard to remember that he was her target, a potentially dangerous man who pushed drugs at his father's insistence. As his arm slug over the back of her chair and she leaned back into it, she thought that her mission for tonight couldn't have gone better. She held her cards close to her chest with one hand and took a swig straight out of her rapidly emptying bottle. Yup, she was in trouble.


	4. Easy

Her initial assessment two hours previous had not been far off the mark. It was easy. Easy to ignore the pain of the bricks that dug into her back when the pain was mixed with the pleasure of his hand slipping past her underwear while he kissed her neck, her arms clutching him ever closer. It was easy to kiss him as his mouth swallowed her groan of 'Zak' as his fingers hit just the right spot. All too easy to just let herself sag, a rag doll held up by his arms, all pretence of the tough ass flight instructor gone as she melted slowly in a darkened alley, the cool breeze soothing her overheated skin.

Her eyes opened as he chuckled merrily, and in the shadows, it was easy to see his smug grin as one of affection. "I knew I could get you to call me Zak."

She pushed gently at his hands moving off the wall with a grimace that she knew she hadn't been successful at hiding. "Yeah, well don't let it go to your head nugget. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity."

"Oh no. I don't think so, Kara." He laughed again and she could see the white flash of his teeth as he smiled. That smile made her want to reach up and kiss him again, but she couldn't it was too soon. Too disruptive to a plan that had so far gone so smoothly as long as you didn't count the urges she was now feeling for her mark. She would play the hard to get one, the challenge all men secretly pined for.

"I've had my fun. I'll see you in class." She turned to face the street the unsteadiness of her legs regretfully no act. "Goodnight, Adama." She tossed over her shoulder with an accompanying wink.

There were only three strides between them when he reached out to grasp her wrist, twisting and pulling her back towards him. She didn't fight as his lips sought out hers, but she didn't fully go along with the slow probing kiss either. Her hands stayed at her sides not moving to touch, and soon he released her.

"I thought you could use a goodnight kiss." His words were soft so unlike his actions earlier. She knew then that she had played the situation right that he would not let her go easily.

So she reached out to him once more, the tips of her fingers sliding down his bare arm. "Goodnight, Zak." Her words were as soft as his had been.

Even the night could not hide the way his eyes lit up at the mention of his name. Still she turned away, and had almost reached the street when his "Goodnight Kara" was carried forward, whispered on the wind.

Being with Zak was easy; it was remembering why that was all too hard.

* * *

><p>The smirk that graced her lips was unstoppable. Today was the nuggets first day in the sims and she couldn't help but enjoy taking their egos down a notch or two. Sure there might be a few natural pilots in the bunch, some might even make it through a smooth landing, but such skills were few and far between.<p>

"Alright listen up. Today's the first day of the rest of your life. For some of you the exhilaration of shooting out a launch tube is going to be like a drug, addicting, something that you can't get anywhere else. For others well let's just hope you brought an extra pair of skivvies." The fun was going to be trying to predict who was going to be in which group.

"Any questions before we begin?" Faces filled with a combination of fear and anticipation looked up at her but no one raised a hand. "Then let's begin."

The lights dimmed as the first group of flight-suited cadets moved to the attached sim room donning their helmets as they went. Adama winked at her from the end of the line when he thought that no one was looking. She smiled back encouragingly, glad that he was trying to keep their relationship below the surface even if they were the worst kept secret in the Academy. At least none of her fellow instructors had called her on it yet. But then again that would require them to actually acknowledge her presence. She pushed such negative thoughts from her mind, and went back to smiling.

There was a low rumble as the sims powered up, but it was soon drowned out by the hum of the overhead projector. The split screen behind her showed a virtual cockpit display of each of the vipers in the sim squadron. Having their classmates watch every sim provided the dual motivation of public humiliation for every screw up and the ability to learn from the mistakes and triumphs of others.

The automated computer voice that acted as the LSO and comm. officer of the imaginary battlestar _Zeus_, along with comm. traffic of the cadets was patched through the classroom's speakers. She couldn't help but be impressed by the discipline that her students were showing, but she was sure that it was going to fall apart soon enough. It always did.

"As previously discussed there will be no surprises today. You will launch, attempt to perform one full circuit of the _Zeus_ in standard squadron formation, before landing your bird safely in the port landing bay. The first one of you who actually manages to do this very simple set of tasks without getting their virtual ass kicked by the black screen of death gets a gold star."

The glow from the projector outlined the cocky smiles of some of her students, the ones still foolish enough to think that driving a viper was easy. Her smile stretched even wider. She hadn't had this much fun in months, even before this crazy ass mission for CFIS had taken over her life.

Without turning to look behind her, she knew the moment that the first virtual vipers launched. Laughter and joy filled the comms, along with a few barely restrained screams of terror. She had moved from behind the podium just fast enough to see the first explosion and accompanying black square where a cockpit display had once been. Atchinson had pulled up on his stick too much trying to form up with the others and had crashed into the hull of the _Zeus_. It might even have been some kind of record for a nugget to only last seven seconds in a sim.

Zak and Billings were next when shaky piloting by them both had caused them to crash into each other, narrowly missing Drake as she hurriedly moved her bird out of the danger zone swerving out of what was passing for a formation with the remaining nuggets. Her ship spun in wild barrel rolls before she was able to regain control and rejoin the slow circle of the _Zeus_. Starbuck was impressed by Drake's ability, especially given her written test results, which had suggested that she would be one of the first to flunk out of today's test. It looked like today was going to be a day of surprises.

* * *

><p>She rubbed the back of her neck, trying unsuccessfully to get the worst of the kinks out as she sat hunched over her desk filling in evaluations on her students' first sim performance. Paperwork must have been designed by the Gods, a suitable punishment for the sins of unworthy mortals such as herself. There was no other explanation that could adequately describe the horrors of the military bureaucracy at its' finest. While overall she had been impressed by the performance of the cadets in her class, it didn't make filling out these damn evals any easier, and she still had six more to go.<p>

A brisk knock at her door startled her out of describing exactly how to complete a proper landing on to the moving deck of a battlestar.

"Enter." She quickly went back to work when she saw that it was just Zak.

That first Friday night in the bar had been five weeks ago and the only thing that she had gleamed from being Zak Adama's girlfriend was that he was everything that Kara Thrace wanted in a boyfriend. He enjoyed his life, his liquor, his triad, and did just enough school work to get by without getting into trouble. What she hadn't expected was that there were moments when he could be surprisingly tender, like just now when he rubbed the tension out of her shoulders.

"Come on babe. It's almost 22:00, why don't you leave the rest for tomorrow." His voice was soft and soothing, and she leaned back into his touch. He was the only person on all of the twelve worlds who would dare to call her babe, but that didn't mean she had to like it.

"I thought I told you not to call me that Adama?" Some of her frustration with all things paperwork related slipped into her voice. "You should be trying to get into my good graces after that frakked up sim of yours today." She meant it as a joke, but it didn't come out that way.

"That was completely Billings' fault, Starbuck and you know it."

"Well maybe if you had been paying attention to the words that were coming out of my mouth in lectures instead of ogling my chest, you might have been able to avoid him." It was a harsh blow, and she knew it, but she wasn't in the mood for any of his games tonight. His hands left her shoulders, and he moved to face her, his brown eyes hardening as his jaw clenched. She sighed slowly and stood up before he could say anything else.

"Look, I'm sorry alright. The joy of watching you nuggets lose some of your ego went out the air lock the minute I started all this frakked up pencil pushing." She tried to smile, hoping that she could at least fix some of the damage that her words had caused. Their relationship was not all sunlight and daisies, and had never been about that, but she couldn't take the chance that he might get frustrated enough to bring it all to an end. Not when she had learned next to nothing about the drug ring that he was supposedly involved in.

"Yeah, I know how much you hate the stuff, I should have realized that you might not be in the best of moods." He reached across the desk for one of her hands, rubbing his thumb softly over her knuckles. "But I can think of a way that you can make it up to me."

His eyes danced in the light from her desk lamp, her outburst had been quickly forgiven. It was one of the things that she liked the most about him, his willingness to forgive. "Oh yeah, Adama?" Her words were playful, and she was rewarded with a coy smile.

"Yeah, why don't you come with me so that we can discuss things."

"I had more in mind than discussing." Her laugh filled the small room, merging with his chuckle.

"So did I." Was all he said as she allowed him to lead her out of her office and into the chilly evening.

* * *

><p><em>Starlights<em> was packed with a mix of cadets and regulars. The cadets happy to be through the first batch of midterms and sim tests and looking to let lose, and the regulars through with another workweek and having nowhere better to go. Two seats had been saved for them at the triad table occupied by a pair of Zak's friends, and she settled down comfortably oozing confidence a bottle of ambrosia in one hand and a two glasses in the other.

Four hands in and she had amassed a healthy pile of winnings much to the disappointment of the unsuspecting nuggets.

Zak laughed with a smugly. "I wasn't kidding when I said my girl can play." His hands roamed possessively along her shoulders as he spoke.

"Well I'm afraid that Beth and I are going to have to take a little break." Marshall lead his companion in the direction of the head, and if his hands pressed under the edge of Beth's tanks exposing a strip of pale skin in the smoky haze of the bar were any indication he had a particular consolation prize in mind.

"Looks like I'll just have to steal all your money Adama." She downed her remaining ambrosia before turning to face him with a smirk.

"I'd had something else in mind actually." He stilled her hands that were in the process of reaching into her pocket for a cigar.

"Did you now?" She closed the gap between them and gave him a quick teasing kiss. "And just what would this something else be?"

She was surprised when he didn't move to kiss her back, but reached into the pocket of his fatigues instead a touch of nervousness to his movements. Oh Lords, she hoped that he wasn't going to do anything monumentally stupid like propose. She hadn't even said that she loved him yet. Her worry turned to a completely sort of anxiety when he pulled out a clear plastic bag holding two small blue pills. Crystelene. So this was it, the moment she had been waiting for, for the past five weeks. The moment that solidified that Zak Adama at least had access to the drug he was suspected of pushing onto his fellow cadets.

"What's that?" She was proud when her voice didn't waver.

"The ticket to the best frak of your life." His reply was whispered in close to her ear, and she shivered involuntarily at the feel of the warm air on her neck. He took one pill out of the bag and placed it on his tongue letting it soften before he swallowed. "You game, Kara?"

She had come too far to say no so she reached forward and turned the second pill over slowly in her hands before raising it to her lips. It tasted chalky as the substance mixed with the residual alcohol in her mouth and she swallowed it quickly.

"What's it called?" The effects were already making themselves known, her vision seemed sharper her mind better able to catalogue the sights around her.

"Crystelene. Now let's get out of here before we waste all our fun." Nodding she followed him swiftly out into the mist of the night.

He led her to the few blocks to the crappy hotel room that he had procured for the night. Her steps felt more powerful and she could feel each particle of mist as it touched her skin. Zak's fingers remained entwined with her own, and every pull of his fingers caused her to gasp slightly.

Before she knew what was happening the backs of her knees had hit the edge of a bed. Her mind took in insignificant details, like the shoddy state of the black bedspread and the bare light bulb that was covered in dust, while other things conceivably more important things were lost in a haze of feeling. She fought to allow her mind to retain some sort of control, but it was a battle could not win. All she could think about was the feel of Zak's fingers as they ran through the short hairs by her ears, the smell of ambrosia on his breath as it flowed over her nose, and the tingle that stretched like a current through her body to her toes.

So she gave up the fight, easily and happily surrendered into a state where she didn't have to think about anything more difficult then how she was going to get out of her bra in order to feel that exquisite touch on her breasts. Didn't have to think about how this changed things, how there was proof to match the suspicions, how there was no chance of exonerating the man with whom she was rapidly blurring the lines of fictive daydream and dutiful reality. None of it mattered anymore and for the first time in years, she left her mind and her worries behind and simply revelled in the easy simplicity of sensation.


End file.
